HARD KNOX (16 page)

twenty-nine

(knox)

*NOW*

I stepped into the chapel and the
guys were all lined up, waiting for me. Liam was first and he grabbed me,
hugging me. I swallowed down the emotion and went with the motion of the sign
of respect from my brothers. This wasn’t just about losing our President, this
was also about me losing my father.

The old man… Hammer… was dead.

Murdered in prison.

When I got to Slam, he squeezed me
so tight, I felt my back pop. “I’m so fucking sorry, brother. We’ll fucking fix
this.”

“Thanks, bro,” I said.

Behind Slam was an empty chair with
King’s cut on it. That one hurt bad. Really fucking bad. I wondered if King
would even find out about my old man’s murder.

Then there was Uncle Jakey. A
whiskey bottle in his hand. A big frown on his face. He was too far back from
the group.

“Now what?” he asked me. “Huh? This
is what happened. This is what we get.”

I took the words, knowing this was
how Uncle Jakey showed grief and cried.

He took a big drink of the whiskey
and then threw the bottle against the wall. It shattered and we all stood there
in silence.

I blinked hard and fast. I let it
all sink in and process. The worst part was that I had to leave Ana alone. I
told her what had happened and she started to cry. She begged me to stay,
clawing at me, but I needed to be with my brothers. I needed to get all the
information and then act upon it.

Normally I’d just be straight with
hellfire but I had a family.

“Everyone take a goddamn seat,” Uncle
Jakey said.

He stumbled to the head of the
table.

We all sat and each one of us lit
up a smoke.

“I got the call from Chuck,” Uncle
Jakey said. “He said it couldn’t be stopped.”

Chuck was one of many of the
employees at the prison that worked for the Reap.

“How?” I asked.

Uncle Jakey touched his neck. “Quick.
Bloody.”

“Retaliation,” I said. “For what he
gave me. For the MC.”

“
The Family
?” Slam asked.

“Don’t jump so far ahead,” Uncle
Jakey said. He reached with his left hand and grabbed my forearm. “We got the
guard who set it up.”

“What?” I asked.

“It was fast,” Uncle Jakey said. “Chuck,
Brian, and Winston were able to arrange something. I was calling for a while,
Knoxville. I wanted you in on this. I wanted you to hear it all.”

I had been too busy proposing to
Ana and then fucking her.

“It was your buddy,” Slam said. “Porter.”

“What?” I asked. “Who the fuck was
here?”

Turned out that Slam, Matteo, and
Ari were all there while Uncle Jakey was on the phone with Winston as they gave
up the information needed about my father’s death.

My father had been murdered late
last night. A guard took him to another holding room because there was drug
trafficking in his cell. That was a cover to get him out of the cell. Then
Porter himself showed up and killed my father. Of course, Porter couldn’t have
been acting alone in all of the situation, but he was the one who did it.

Vinny was pissed that my old man
had given up the information to me. I found out that my old man had worked a
deal with
the family
on the inside. Protection, drugs, everything. That
hurt a little bit worse than him actually dying.

I stood up from my chair and walked
to the wall.

“Knoxville, sit down,” Uncle Jakey
said.

“No,” I said. “My old man was a
fucking rat.”

“No,” Ari said.

“Yes,” Slam said. “Face it. Tell
the truth. He was a fucking rat.”

I looked back at Slam. I could
always count on Slam telling it like it was.

“That he was,” Uncle Jakey said. He
slowly stood up. “He wanted to make sure the Reap stayed quiet. Okay? He and I
had talked about it for a while. He didn’t want this life to consume the rest
of you all. Like it did to King.”

“King is serving his sentence,” I
said. “He did a crime, he’s paying for it. Just like we all would. This isn’t
about pride. Hammer decided his own fate when he got into bed with Vinny.”

“Maybe he had no choice,” Uncle
Jakey said. “The pressure was on for a long time, Knoxville. More than you
understand. Local and Federal eyes were everywhere. We couldn’t push them away
fast enough.”

“So he just sold us out?” I asked. “Then
he never told me about it? Only to… what… give me intel that would help the
club but secure his murder…”

“He did for you and the Reap,” Uncle
Jakey said. “That’s why, okay? And when it happened, our men went to work. The
guard who set it up is now dead. Our men did it. Men with Reaper’s Bastards ink
in their arms. We know all of the truth. Hammer took the fall for the MC
because
the family
tried selling us out. So when Hammer went down, so
did their plan. The club took a step back and Hammer spent every day on the
inside working, hustling, learning all he could. So he gave to you, Knoxville,
the information that keeps us in power. He died with honor, defending his MC.
Like a good President would do.”

The room stood in complete silence.

My father had always been the same
man. The man who twisted, turned, and would do anything to survive. I watched
him act like that my entire life. Job to job, woman to woman, never settling.
Hell, maybe even with the Reap he wasn’t truly settled. No matter what, he was
now dead. He’d get an honorable burial as a member of the club and that would
be it.

“This is personal,” I said. “Porter
did this. Whether Vinny wanted it or not, he did it. Because I took Ana from
him.”

“Which is why this is your play,” Uncle
Jakey said. He touched the gavel and slid it toward me. “You need to settle
this, Knoxville. For your own sake.”

“There’s a lot at stake here,” I
said. I looked to all my brothers and told them the news. “Ana is wearing my
ring. And she’s carrying my baby.”

Shock spread across all their
faces.

Uncle Jakey walked to me and
grabbed me. He hugged me tight and kissed my forehead. The rest of the guys
damn near jumped me, congratulating me. It was a nice moment to share in the
midst of tragedy.

When the ruckus settled, I started
to realize the old man would never know about me and Ana. He’d never see her
round belly or meet his grandchild. Not that I really spent a lot of time with
him. We weren’t some tight father and son bullshit thing. That ship sailed long
before I was even born. Even still, if it wasn’t for him, I would have never
been patched into the Reap. My only choice was to honor him by keeping the
vision alive.

That meant finishing this thing.

I walked to the table and placed my
hand over the gavel. Again, this was a no vote situation.

“I’m going to kill Porter,” I said.

Nobody objected. Nobody spoke.

The truth…

What fucking choice did I have?

I stood at the old man’s grave and
lit up a smoke. I sat on the headstone and left footprints in the fresh dirt.
As a kid I always feared a hand would shoot up out of the ground and get me. Ma
blamed the old man for that because he used to let me watch scary movies.
Especially around Halloween. That was probably the one time he really came to
life around me.

I made the decision to let the dust
clear a little. It was the smartest thing to do. Chances were, Porter was on
the run, or hiding. Vinny would be expecting me to call him, which I did. We
had a discussion on the phone over the power between our organizations and what
it meant for the town and city. He assured me that my father was going to be
taken out one way or another and that by letting Porter do it, it seemed to
truly calm everything down.

My response was simple.

Porter was going to die.

I wasn’t going to hide my hand. The
thing that Vinny did have that I did… well, that one thing would take care of
everything.

Not to mention the names and
locations of those Vinny took out. Again, peeling back a page of respect, I
told Vinny that I would keep those names close to my chest. What had happened
with the old man and Porter was simply personal. Anything greater would be
viewed as an attack against the Reap and all hell would break loose. Strange as
it was, we came to a sense of peace over the phone. Vinny even offered the club
a protection run which I accepted and then handed the info over to Uncle Jakey.
He was acting President. I had enough on my fucking plate.

I finished my smoke and dropped it
to the dirt. I stepped and twisted, spiritually sending the old man one last
drag. I looked back at the stone and saw his name.

Shaking my head, I patted the stone
and whispered, “Not today, old man. Not today.”

I walked through the cemetery to my
motorcycle. All these souls all around. There was something powerful about it.
But I kept my eyes forward. If I didn’t keep everything forward, I’d end up in
one of the holes myself. That wasn’t going to happen.

I climbed on my ride, fired it up,
and checked the time.

I smiled.

Today I got to hear the
heartbeat of my baby.

To me the screen was like a TV
without reception. To the woman in front of the machine with the wand stuck up
my darlin’s hole, it made sense to her what she was seeing. The press of a
button here and there brought up some blue color, some red color, and then she
settled on what looked like a black opening with a white bean on the inside.

That was my kid.

Yeah, Ana had an ultrasound
already. The pregnancy was confirmed. She showed me the picture and I took it
to the clubhouse, and me and the boys all drank whiskey until the sun came up.

But to be there and actually see
it. The look on Ana’s face. The way the lady pointed at the screen and told me
that the little bean on the screen was my baby. That was…

It was everything I was fighting
for.

It was the final piece to my plan
to end this spat with Vinny and Porter. It was to tie up the last loose end and
all of us could then go forward and live.

I grabbed Ana’s hand and squeezed
it tight. I leaned forward and kissed her.

“I love you, darlin’,” I whispered.

“I know you do, Knox,” she said.

That was the greatest thing to
hear.

Well, actually it became the second
greatest thing to hear.

A few seconds later, the lady
pressed a button and I heard a heartbeat. The damn thing was racing and the
lady told me it was not only normal but that the heartbeat was perfect.
Everything was perfect. She printed out a bunch of pictures, almost like a
photo booth, and that was it.

From there on out it was up to Ana
to schedule appointments and monitor her body. Her morning sickness was
actually an after-lunch-sickness, which was common. There was nothing to do but
ride it out. I hated seeing Ana get sick and she would get so embarrassed
throwing up in front of me, but I didn’t give a fuck. I sat on the edge of the
tub and rubbed her back. I held her hair back and cleaned everything up when
she was done. Her body couldn’t help it. It was all the racing changes being
made so she could carry life. The life we created.

The lady left the room and I went
and locked the door.

Ana inched up and grinned at me. “Is
this because my pants are off? Or because another woman was touching me down
there?”

I laughed. “Now that you mention it…”

I approached the table and then sat
in the chair the lady had been on. I pointed to the screen which was frozen
with a picture of the bean.

“That’s our baby, darlin’,” I said.

“Yes it is, Knox.”

“Our bean.”

“Our bean,” she repeated.

I had a lot running through my
mind. Timing was never a strong suit of mine and I knew talking right then wasn’t
the smartest thing in the world. But I couldn’t help myself.

I put a hand to Ana’s leg. “Do you
want to get dressed first?”

“First… for…?”

“What we need to talk about.”

She sat up even more. “Knox…”

“I know. Timing.”

“Fuck timing,” Ana said. “I need to
know what’s going on. I’m not stupid, Knox. I know this has to do with your
father’s death. I can feel it lingering around you. I’ve been around this life
long enough…”

I cut her off with another kiss.

For some reason it never really
struck me that we had been together for so long. Yeah, maybe not
fucking-like-rabbits-getting-pregnant-then-getting-engaged, but our lives had
been twisted up pretty damn tight since we were teenagers. Since the second she
climbed out of that yellow moving truck and looked at me.

So I had to tell her right then. I
had to give it to her straight.

I had to tell her my plan
…
and tell her that our little family may not make it.

thirty

(ana)

*THEN*

She was a shell of the woman I had
grown to hate. And that was a terrible word to use as I stood there and looked
down at my dying mother. The cancer had won a long time ago, but now it was
about to completely finish the battle for good. The doctors warned me she didn’t
have much time. That was pretty obvious when she was put in the hospital two
months prior for a last chance hope at some kind of treatment. But it was too
far.

It had always been too far.

The way it had fallen apart between
me and my mother was tragic, kind of like her cancer. I wondered if I had been
there earlier I could have convinced her to get checked sooner and all of this
sickness would have been avoided.

Not like it mattered much in that
moment.

Her eyes were shut for the first
few minutes so I just sat there and thought about everything. I thought about
when the truth came out that my mother had been sleeping with Knox’s father.
The hell that it caused between the two houses was so bad. Knox’s mother left
and never came back. Then Knox started to slip away, deeming into the arms of
the Reaper’s Bastards. He would still stop by every now and again, but not like
he used to. Then things got physical between my mother and me. I was able to
take it a few times but then I swung back, just once, and that was it.

I couldn’t believe I had hit my own
mother. That was when I left. I struggled to find my own place and I secretly
hoped Knox would come find me. Come get me and save me. Maybe I’d never have
the fantasy life I dreamed of, but I would at least have Knox.

That never happened though. A week
became a month. A month became a year. The only call I got was about my mother
being sick. And it was from her doctors. She didn’t even want me to know.

The first time I saw her she looked
okay. We never talked about what happened. I thought about bringing it up many
times but each time I saw her she was sicker and sicker.

I started to cry, something I said
I wouldn’t do in front of her.

I cried for everything.

How one day I woke up and my life
was forever changed. My stuff loaded into a moving truck. Then climbing out of
that moving truck and seeing Knox. The storm may have calmed but it was still
raging.

The machines around my mother kept
beeping. I had no idea what wires and tubes did what for her, if anything. At
this point I was pretty sure it was all about pain management. The doctors
wanted her to go comfortably. My mother hadn’t been comfortable in a long time.

I hated watching it. I hated crying
over it. I hated that she was going to die.

I couldn’t control any of it. That
was the worst part. I couldn’t control her health. I couldn’t control what Knox
was doing, wherever he was and whatever he was doing. Each day I woke up and
expected to see a headline of Knox getting arrested or killed. I tried to keep
up with what I could about the Reaper’s Bastards but it was next to impossible.

Letting out a shaky breath, I
reached forward and took my mother’s hand. I had to say goodbye to her for the
last time.

To my surprise, she turned her head
and opened her eyes. She looked right at me. For a quick second she seemed full
of life and hope.

“Ana… my sweet girl, Ana…”

“Mom,” I said. “Don’t get all mushy
on me right now. I can’t take it.”

I smiled.

She smiled.

She coughed and looked like she was
in intense pain.

“Take it easy,” I said.

“I am,” she whispered. “Today is
it, Ana. I’m not doing it anymore.”

“You don’t have to.”

“I’m sorry I let you down. In life.”

“Stop,” I said. “I’m not going to
talk about all that right now. It’s too late for it all. I’m here. Okay?”

She nodded. She looked forward and
her eyes got really heavy. They started to shut and her grip on my hand went
weak. I shook her hand, feeling the emotion recharge itself inside me.

No, no, no, no
…

I stood up and leaned over the bed.
I kissed her forehead, feeling how cold and clammy she was.

“I love you, Mom,” I said. “It’s
okay to let go. I’m not mad at you. I don’t hate you. I’m sorry that you got
sick like this. You can be free now. I promise, I’ll be okay.”

She never opened her eyes again.
But she did speak to me one last time. Her words forever tattooed into my heart
and soul.

“Ana
… I was wrong
…
you need someone like him to save you
… you need a man
… you need
to find Knox
…”